Chapter 38 Alexander
Alexander
The sound of two bodies hitting the ground made me open Alex’s eyes.
Teivel and Lady McDonald both lay with their chests rising and falling. Cayden stepped in front of me. “If I kill Alex’s body, does that free your mind?”
“No,” I croaked. Teivel’s punch to Alex’s gut, cutting off my earlier scream, had broken at least two ribs. “You figured out it wasn’t me. Took you long enough.”
Cayden gritted his teeth. “How do I get this off you?”
“We need Teivel’s magic.”
Cayden nodded. I suspected that was the entire reason he had put the man to sleep instead of killing him. The rune mage pulled the huge body snatcher to me before drawing in the air.
Quinn’s scream ripped through the roar of the crowd. I wanted to tell him to hurry, but this was Cayden. He was already going as fast as he could, probably while cursing my existence.
Cayden grunted and stuck his hand into the rune he’d just drawn. A spiked forest-green glove covered his hand. “This is going to wake him up. I suggest you scurry back to your body fast.”
‘I don’t scurry’ was on the tip of my tongue, but before I could say a word, Cayden grabbed Teivel’s hand in his spiked magic and slammed it forward…
except his physical hand didn’t move, only a dark outline.
Teivel groaned in pain, and Cayden pulled the outline to my neck.
The latch on my collar clicked and popped open.
“We’re going to talk about whatever that was,” I promised.
Cayden scowled. “I’m going to Quinn.”
Teivel groaned again, but both of us were already running in our own ways.
Quinn fought for her life. ‘His’ Quinn. In Alex’s mind, she was nothing but womb and salvation, the only thing left that mattered.
I approached my body carefully to keep the element of surprise on my side, though the closer I got, the more I felt. Alex babbled to Rowan, who guarded my body, while Quinn’s Majekah split Chancellor Morgen into two.
Tears, Alex’s, not mine, streaked down my face.
This wasn’t what was supposed to happen. Quinn was supposed to be safe. Teivel lied. They always lied. Alex was just as locked out of his body as I was mine. Powerless, broken, and alone.
Quinn pulled herself to Chancellor Morgen’s body and rocked, while the leader of the Westwaters stood over them, injecting meaning into the meaningless.
The crowd roared, far more people upset by the danger in this trial than by the results.
She could have died. Silas and I were going to have words.
In a flash, Alex pulled himself out of his misery and noticed me. We hovered, two minds crammed in one skull, each waiting to see who would lunge first.
‘She’s hurting,’ Alex said.
‘I’m a fool.’ I repeated verbatim what he called me. ‘I agreed to let her take these tests because I thought it was the easiest path. I thought no one wanted to hurt her. I should have fought for her.’
Alex still hadn’t returned to his body. In his own confused way, he loved Quinn. I took a chance.
‘We should have fought for her.’
My body tensed, still clearly under Alex’s control. I didn’t want to fight him to get it back, but I would.
The Westwater’s voice boomed off the walls. Outrage and agreement crashed back from the stands, a wave of noise that swelled higher with every word. People, some not even my allies, asked why I’d even let them fight if I genuinely had power over their free will.
It was a great question, and I leaned into Alex. ‘Free will or not, I would have put a stop to this the minute Morgen appeared, but I couldn’t.’
Rage burned the air around me. The Pit’s noise rose to a deafening pitch. Men had charged in. The army Alex hid from me. I didn’t have time for this.
Alex tried to move my body, and Rowan loomed over us, clamping our wrists down on the chair. “I don’t know what the fuck is going on, but this is a fucking ambush. I need orders, sir.”
Suddenly, Alex vanished. I dropped into my own body.
“Drop the fucking ‘sir,’” I snarled, flexing my fingers in Rowan’s grip to assure myself I still had them.
Rowan released me, and I stood, only to stumble back into my seat. Voices filled my mental ears, making it hard to focus.
‘What the fuck happened?’ Teivel demanded, his speech still slightly slurred.
‘The Architect broke the collar,’ Alex wheezed. ‘And forced me out, we need to run… there will always—’
Pain split my lip, though not my real one.
‘No. We go ahead as planned. Take her mind now,’ Teivel snarled.
Despite the distance between us, I found the old mentalist’s gaze. Teivel loomed over him, his fist already raised to strike again. The Pit vanished from my view. I looked down at a kid, no older than twelve, with a swollen black eye, who studied me with a fear-filled gaze.
I was in Alex’s memory. The kid was me. Alex, starved of friendship, showed me everything. I cried for the family that never loved me, and he soaked it up like salvation. Too quickly, I realized the toys we made were weapons, the collars for slaves. My stomach twisted.
To Alex, young me was clever, but na?ve.
The compound meant food and safety. It was the only thing he’d ever known.
He tried to keep me safe in his world, but I couldn’t stomach his reality.
One day, I snapped, reached into every mind and erased their very breaths.
In a minute, only the old mentalist and I were still drawing in air.
Alex had frozen—no food, no way out, terrified. I pushed, pulled, begged, but he wouldn’t move. So, I left him.
Guilt hit me again, but Alex layered it in pride. I’d run. He’d stayed, terrified and hating the life he begged to keep.
He’d all but forgotten me until Quinn broke his collar, connecting us. Suddenly, a lifetime of regrets became his world. The twelve-year-old version of me was now a man in Quinn’s memory, and all Alex wanted was that connection once more.
He’d gone about it the wrong way.
He knew that now.
He hadn’t seen Quinn as a person, just another Bert and Ernie.
He understood differently now.
The Pit returned, and Alex’s cerulean-blue gaze still locked with mine.
‘Alex, did you hear me?’ Teivel demanded.
“Xan, please snap out of it,” Rowan pleaded.
I looked away from Alex. ‘Quinn. Alex is going to give you instructions. I need you to follow them. Trust me.’
‘Go unconscious. Now.’ Alex demanded, but not with his mental powers, only his words.
Quinn, still sitting in pain and swirling with her inner turmoil, managed to take a single deep breath and “collapsed.”
‘Excellent,’ Teivel hissed, savoring it like blood in his mouth.
The sound of steel rang, and I looked down to see a Grierson drawing a sword against a McDonald. The Pit was a powder keg—one spark from exploding as allies and enemies screamed over each other.
Movement caught my eye. Figures pressed forward, women. Their magic flared as the crowd jeered and shoved, half cheering them, half trying to drag them back.
The first one put her hand out and sent her magic into the metal, followed by the next and the next, until at least fifteen channels of various colors made a rainbow, fighting against the spells keeping them out.
Steel and magic groaned, then exploded, rocking my seat.
Whatever power held the cage in place died, and pieces hit the floor in massive chunks.
‘Unexpected,’ Teivel sneered. ‘But skirts tear easily. Cut them down. Take what’s left.’
A horn blasted from his box. The stands erupted, spectators tore off cloaks and coats, revealing a sea of body snatchers, orange-haired McDonalds glaring like sparks in the dark. Slave collars bit into their necks.
My heart raced. The women were already boosting themselves onto the raised fighting ring with Quinn, while their brothers and friends surrounded it from the ground.
I found Brit’s glowing moss-green skin, baring her teeth at a group of men who clearly intended to charge forward but were surprised by the turn of events.
It was something—women rallying, allies rising, but the mob still dwarfed us, three to one, their roar shaking the ring.
Rowan shook me. “Xan. I know you’re in there. Can you take care of yourself? I need to get to Quinn.”
“Go.” I managed to use my vocal cords. “You can do nothing here.”
Rowan squeezed my shoulder once before turning and leaping out of our box toward his family below. Wind came at his call, controlling his descent as he rallied his brothers.
Instead of following him to what certainly would have been a broken leg, I locked my gaze on Teivel, still looming, still pulling every string. Alex was noise. Teivel was the serpent, and serpents are cut off at the head.